The first-time buyer is disappearing
The average age of a first-time homebuyer hit 40 in 2025, up from 33 in 2019. First-time buyers now make up only about 21% of all buyers, down from a historical range of 33-40%. That's a real structural shift, not a blip.
Affordability is the obvious explanation, and it's a real one. But there's a curiosity in the data worth sitting with: single females represent about 19% of buyers, compared to just 10% for single males. That gap sent me looking for what else might be pulling younger male buyers out of the market.
The dopamine problem
My working theory: sports gambling and cryptocurrency are pulling investment dollars — and attention — away from real estate for a meaningful slice of younger buyers. About 77% of sports gambling participants are male, and 72% of cryptocurrency investors are male. Both offer something real estate structurally can't: immediate, high risk/high reward feedback. A down payment doesn't deliver a dopamine hit. A crypto trade or a same-day parlay does.
Real estate is still, in my view, one of the better paths to building wealth over time. But it asks for patience, and it's no longer delivering the roughly 10% annual returns that defined the last decade. That's a much harder sell against something that can double your money by dinner.
What's new in the market
- Median home price: $605,000 as of the end of April
- Homes under contract: down 2% month-over-month, but up 8% year-over-year
- Mortgage rates ticked up half a point following recent geopolitical tension
- The market isn't moving uniformly — we're seeing genuinely hot neighborhoods next to genuinely cold ones
Featured listing
2620 W 110th Ave, Denver, CO 80234 — 3 bed, 3 bath, 2,128 sq ft, $659,000.